Surprise! Luke surprised us all and decided to come a week and a half early! Dan and I were totally not ready- no bags were packed and his room was not quite finished. We were, however, much more prepared in the area of actual labor and delivery. We participated in a 12 week Bradley Method course which taught us so much about relaxation, pain management, and the general birthing process. Even though we had been through this before with Amelia- we learned so much about how to do things naturally.
Wednesday morning, Jan11th, I woke up about 4am with some contractions. I dozed in between them and started to time them when I noticed they were getting closer together. By the time Dan got up for work around 7am, I told him I was having contractions and they were about 10 minutes apart. We were both in complete shock- thinking this was just false labor. So I got up and moved around to see if the contractions would go away or slow down- they didn't. I sat down again after breakfast- no change. We decided to go walking at the mall. After getting Amelia settled with a friend we headed to the mall and walked. We walked and we walked and we walked. After lunch we headed to Toys R Us to get a present for Amelia from the baby (we had planned to do that over the weekend- thinking we still had time). Dan ran out to the car to grab my wallet and locked his keys in the car. Luckily we have AAA and when they heard his wife was in labor they had our car open in 15 minutes! So we went back to the mall to walk some more. I was getting to the point where I had to stop walking when a contraction came and I couldn't talk through them.
We headed to the hospital to see how I was progressing. I was 3cm dilated and 70% effaced. The nurse said if we really wanted to go natural to go home and try to relax, eat, take a bath/shower and come back when the pain was unbearable. I was disappointed but we went home. After a nice relaxing bath and a light dinner the contractions starting coming harder and closer together. We tired several positions from our Bradley class and I found that kneeling next to the couch with my head on the couch and laying on my side were the best for me. The contractions were now coming every 3-5 minutes and were lasting about a minute. Finally I was ready to go to the hospital.
I don't remember anything about the ride to the hospital- I was zoned out and solely focused on relaxing through each contraction. After checking in at the hospital- I was 5cm dilated and 80% effaced. We finally got all settled in our room and the contractions were every 3 minutes or so and lasting around a minute to a minute and a half. I sat on a birthing ball for awhile but found the side lying positing to be the most relaxing for pain management. After about 2 hours they checked me again and I was at 8cm! They called for the doctor and told me to let them know if I felt the urge to push. Luckily I have no recollection of time- I had no idea what time it was or even how much time had passed. I was so completely focused on just trying to relax and taking the contractions one at a time. The doctor came and they checked me again and I was complete- but still did not feel the urge to push. I eagerly agreed to have my water broken and just minutes later I definitely felt the urge to push. Dan said I only pushed for 5-7 minutes! The doctor wasn't even ready and they had to tell me to stop pushing. I remember yelling out 'it hurts' and 'I can't stop pushing' so the nurse said to go ahead and push. Luke came fast and furious at the end! I made it- I had Luke completely natural- with no pain medicine!
They immediately laid Luke skin-to-skin on my chest. He didn't cry right away and was a little blue. The nurses were all rubbing him and trying to stimulate him while Dan cut the cord. Finally Luke let out a sweet little cry and they kept rubbing since he still was looking blue. After several minutes they did take him over to the warmer because his hands and feet were still blue and he sounded congested. Once under the warmer his hands and feet became normal and they suctioned out his mouth. He still didn't cry very much. They laid him back on my chest and I started to breastfeed. He latched on pretty quickly and nursed for a little while.
He was 7lbs, 7oz and 19 inches long. He officially arrived at 11:16pm on 1-11-12. He has a full head of light brown hair- not as much hair as Amelia did but more than peach fuzz. His hair has some blond in it as well- so it's kinda dark blond or light brown- depending on the light. Overall he was very quiet and slept most of the time in the hospital. We kept wanting to see his eyes- once we were home he started having some alert times and we get to see his pretty blue eyes just taking everything in.
Right after his first bath- he cried more after the bath than any other time
Proud Daddy and son
Family photo- (it was like 1am at this point)
the next morning
